Star Trek's Gates McFadden Explains Her Jack Ryan Movie Disappointment

Dr. Cathy Ryan, played by Gates McFadden in The Hunt for Red October, discusses her dismay at being passed over for future Jack Ryan films.
McFadden, along with the rest of the cast from Star Trek: The Next Generation, is presently appearing in the third season of Star Trek: Picard.
McFadden, meantime, had a brush with the blossoming Jack Ryan movie genre in 1990, when she made a cameo appearance in The Hunt For Red October. This was while TNG was still airing.



While Gates McFadden only appeared briefly and said a few words at the beginning of The Hunt For Red October, she will be remembered as the first actress to play Dr. Cathy Ryan, a part that has subsequently been played by Anne Archer, Bridget Moynahan, Keira Knightley, and Abbie Cornish.
McFadden recalls that Alec Baldwin didn't return as Jack Ryan in 1992's Patriot Games because he "requested for too much money," but this isn't the explanation Baldwin provided for Harrison Ford to replace him.


Baldwin posted a column for the Huffington Post in 2011 in which he explained his side of the story regarding his dismissal from the Jack Ryan role after years of lying "a half-truth about schedule issues."
Baldwin said that Paramount "slashed his neck" because the studio owed a famous "actor a big quantity of money for a greenlit project that fell apart," and that "moving me away would assist to lessen that obligation and install someone with considerably more power at the box office than my in the role."
Baldwin is making a reference to the decision to cast Harrison Ford as Jack Ryan in Patriot Games.
Paramount executive David Kirkpatrick, however, disputed Baldwin's allegation, claiming that Baldwin "withdrew from... Patriot Games, over a problem of script approval."


In an interesting twist, Gates McFadden offers a third reason why Alec Baldwin's version of Patriot Games, in which Gates would have reprised her role as Cathy Ryan, was never produced.
McFadden still feels bad about missing out on the opportunity to play the franchise's first female protagonist, years before Star Trek: The Next Generation's cinematic adaptations began with 1994's Star Trek: Generations.
Yet Gates McFadden is giving a career-best performance in Star Trek: Picard's third season. 

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